


"I love you," said the dead man to the dead girl

by WhumpTown



Series: Hurting Hotch [4]
Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, David Rossi is Emily & Hotch's Dad, Declarations Of Love, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fake Character Death, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, He's also their therapist, Hurt Aaron Hotchner, Hurt Hotch, Pining Aaron Hotchner, Pining Emily Prentiss, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:21:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24535297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhumpTown/pseuds/WhumpTown
Summary: David Rossi can see the unresolved tension between Aaron and Emily. Oblivious or afraid of the vulnerability a confession would warrant, Aaron and Emily ignore their feelings for one another. Untell, Emily finds herself sitting in her best friend's blood. Her goodbye torn from her lungs and his life slipping between her fingers.
Relationships: Aaron Hotchner/Emily Prentiss, Emily Prentiss & David Rossi
Series: Hurting Hotch [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1755046
Comments: 7
Kudos: 58





	"I love you," said the dead man to the dead girl

**Author's Note:**

> I apologize for nothing
> 
> (is Hotch a little OOC? yes. That's because UNDER MY WATCH, he's a simp. He is happy! He is in love!)

_**“I looked at everyone and wondered where they came from, and who they missed, and what they were sorry for.” -Jonathon Safran Foer** _

There’s something about the way that he looks at her. It’s all balance and patience. He’s vulnerable and she’s hesitant. Then she’s vulnerable and he’s hesitant. No matter what they come up against, no matter who hurt them they are a staple in each other’s lives. A strange loving dance.

Best friends.

“Watch my drink?” She tucks her hair back behind her ear, giggling as JJ grabs her hand and starts dragging her to the dance floor. She doesn’t need Hotch to verbally confirm that he’ll watch her beer, he does it for all of them even if they don’t ask. “Thank you, Hotch!” She winks at him because she’s already feeling the buzz of her last drink and while it stirs up the heat in his stomach she dances away.

He nods to her request, pulling her glass away from the edge of the table and closer to him. When he looks back up, Dave’s story has come to a dramatic pause. The older man is regarding Hotch with the _look_ and Hotch knows it spells nothing but trouble. “Spit it out, Dave.”

Rossi smirks. First of all, Aaron Hotchner is a man of habit and borderline paranoia. If any of the girls, or the others, walk away from their drinks it’s because they’re leaving them with Hotch. It doesn’t require them to ask him to watch them. Hotch doesn’t move from his spot once he sits down at the bar and nothing short of one of his agents in a bar fight will move him. Second of all, Rossi saw the look shared between Hotch and Emily just now.

It was charged. It was _something_ but it wasn’t innocent and it certainly wasn’t nothing.

“Nothing,” Rossi’s smirk is growing rapidly and he tries and fails to hide it by taking a drink. “I was just wondering when you two got so close.”

Hotch sighs and raises his beer back to his lips to buy himself some time. A subject change is just an admittance of guilt and defensiveness is too. Which leaves nothing short of admission. “We have a lot in common.” He looks over Rossi’s shoulder, counting their heads to make sure he has eyes on everyone. “She’s my friend. We spend a lot of time together because of work, it’s the same relationship I have with any of the others.”

He knows it’s the wrong thing to say the minute it comes out of his mouth. It’s simply not true.

Rossi scoffs and Hotch gets this deep sinking feeling of realization. His eyes wander to the dance floor.

A gaggle of women are all vetting for Morgan's attention. Unbeknownst to them, he's promised to take Reid and Garcia to one of their conventions in the morning. Which means that no matter how enticingly they swing their hips he'll have Reid and Garcia packed up in his car around midnight. He'll empty his pockets and find countless phone numbers and he might call them but it'll be a week or two from now. A case will push him and instead of getting blackout drunk he'll take a girl out on a nice date and the sex will numb him. Maybe for a moment but a moment is all it takes.

Emily, Garcia, and JJ are dancing together. A few men encroach but tonight is about fun and they’re brushed off as quickly as they appear. Emily plays with a few, allowing them just close enough that their hands find her hips but she’s moving to the sound and shakes them off quickly. JJ steps in, the two laughing and enjoying themselves as they playfully grind. Garcia enjoys the attention but more than that she loves when Emily’s drinks kick in and she starts to make fun of Morgan. She’ll stroke her face like she’s got facial hair and they’ll find themselves breathless from laughter.

At a separate table, Reid is swimming in attention. Men, ranging from closer to Hotch’s age than the young genius to twenty-somethings looking for a fling, are quizzing him. They all think they’ve found their one night stand for the afternoon but Reid doesn’t pick on their cues. The women are not as subtle with their advances. A blonde had placed her hand on Reid’s thigh, allowing her fingers to linger downwards but Reid caught her wrist and the advancement was over before it really began. He’s got about five more minutes worth of magic tricks before he takes the chair beside Hotch and asks the man what a woman met by doing an Eiffel tower.

“Earth to Aaron.”

Hotch is pulled from his thoughts, another beer replacing his mostly empty first. “I can’t Dave,” he pushes it away from him and he finds his eyes gravitating back to Emily. It’s like he can’t tear them away. “I have to drive home tonight.” He’s always the designated driver on these nights and, usually, Dave is too. Split between the two of them, it’s easy to get everyone home.

Usually, being a keyword. Rossi almost always sends Hotch with the girls. Which 9 times out of 10 ends in them gushing over Jack or him.

_“I miss your smile,” JJ might admit. “You have those cute little dimples. That’s not to say you’re not handsome, all stoic and sad but you could kill a girl with that smile.” If she beat Emily to the front seat, JJ would reach across the center console and take his hand. Giving it a meaningful, tender squeeze._

_Garcia would hide a giggle behind her hand, “sir, you may not win any wet t-shirt contest but I’ve seen your arms!” All of JJ’s tender softness would be gone in a flash and all three women would be filling the car with deep belly laughs._

_Emily’s compliments would come far more hesitant and only after the other two had been dropped off. Something like “your natural grey? Girls are really into that nowadays” or “the dating scene may suck, Hotch, but you’re a catch. Any girl would be lucky to scoop you up”._

Tonight is no different.

“Did they have fun?” Will meets Hotch at the drive-way, familiar with the little trade-off that the two men now have down pat. Hotch opens the door and Will hands him an Advil and a glass of water. Will gets one look at his wife and smiles happily. Shaking his head, “never mind, she answered that one herself.” Will steps towards the car and softly calls for JJ. “Come on, darlin’, let's get you to bed.”

Hotch goes to his passenger door where Emily Prentiss is currently trying not to throw up. She fails and she and Hotch do an awkward stumble to the grass where Hotch holds her hair back as she ungracefully upheaves liquor and cheese sticks.

“Oh God,” she groans and finds herself leaning into him. “Well, that wasn’t hot.” She wipes a hand over her mouth, face flushed when she meets his eyes. He has to step closer when she attempts to put some space between them. “Stop,” she warns him, hand over her mouth. “I don’t want you to smell my breath!”

Hotch just shakes his head, “ your breath is fine.”

She squints at him in disbelief. Even drunk and sick, she’s hesitant to trust and he finds himself very glad she’s not a flirty drunk. Lest they get themselves in some hot water. “You promise,” she ventures.

He nods, “have I made a habit of lying to you?” The answer is no. Of all the members of the team, of everyone he’s ever loved the truth seems to always make itself known when he’s speaking to her. Even in the hospital, drugged out of his mind he’d attempted to lie. Telling her he couldn’t remember anything after the first stab but two days later he was telling her the truth. That he could remember every word Foyet said and every excruciating detail until the emergency room.

He’ll never forget the tears in her eyes as he told her he was terrified. That he fought intubation and the last thing he remembers is the sound of his own erratic heartbeat before nothing but the cold and pain.

She looks at him now, maybe thinking about Foyet or when he held her hand after Doyle as he told her she was dead. She comes to the same conclusion as him, “I suppose you don’t.”

“I don’t,” he confirms and takes her elbow, this time she doesn't stumble away. “Now, let me get you home.”

Things go much smoother from then on out. She gets in the front seat and she lets him test her seat belt like she imagines he does Jack. When he climbs into the car beside her they both stop for a moment, watching Will lovingly talk to JJ. How in love they are. Just consumed by one another attention’s, oblivious to everything but one another.

“Don’t you ever-” she gets caught up for a moment. “Do you wish you had someone to come home to again?” She’s still a little tipsy but she’s being completely open, vulnerable when she looks at him. She’s never had someone and yet she yearns to. More than anything, she wishes to understand his pain because she thinks it must be unimaginable. He knows what it’s like and he’s had that comfort torn from his hands.

No, it is the complete truth. He doesn’t wish he had _someone_ , he wishes he had her. “I believe a very smart woman once told me that I wasn’t alone,” he turns the car on and for a moment she thinks that’s all he’s going to say. It wouldn’t be the first time he cut off a statement for the sake of emotional detachment but they pull onto the main road and he glances at her.

It all comes stumbling back. His apartment after his first case back after Foyet. She walked him up and despite every nerve in her body telling her to stay, she left him all alone in that empty one-bedroom apartment. Where his boxes lined the walls and Foyet’s file was out to openly haunt him at every turn.

_Robert Call and Tommy. “He’s not alone. He has Tommy”._

“She sounds like a very smart woman,” Emily jokes. “You’re good for listening to her.”

He laughs at that. It’s a soft goofy sound that warms her chest and she looks over at him. The light from the lamps overhead make it seem all overdramatized and high schoolish but it makes her heart leap in her chest

It's that Friday night, on a cold rainy day in November she realizes that she loves him and that made it that much harder to kill him.

_They all see the way Hotch’s back moves, the way it extends as he pulls in a deep breath to warn them. The muscles in his biceps flex as he moves to raise his gun. He doesn’t move out of the way, he’s got a split-second decision to make: move out of the way or warn the others. “Gun!”_

_They’re already moving before their brains register his warning. Diving for cover isn’t a normal tactic used by the FBI but it seems to be a properly advised plan for the BAU. Sometimes, talking isn’t an option. Morgan and Hotch learned that the hard way in Boston. Weeks spent recovering from shrapnel wounds and countless interviews engrave plenty of principles in the mind. That bomb was Gideon’s unraveling. As head negotiator, that bomb and those dead agents circle through Hotch’s head every time he takes on the role._

_There are winded grunts as their bodies hit the ground._

_Morgan is up, over the porch and into the building before anyone can scramble to follow. “UNSUB’s down!” He starts cursing up a storm and the chaos ringing over the radio comes to a sudden halt. Morgan’s voice comes through and forever engraves five words into Emily Prentiss’s brain: Hotch is down. It’s bad._

_It takes ten minutes for medics to arrive on the scene._

_His blood has soaked into the knees of her pants, leaving the denim to look more like the black punk jeans she wore in the eighties. “No,” she shushes him because she knows that look in his eyes. She’s lived through that look and she doesn't want to hear the admissions of a dying man. “Aaron, please, it’s gonna be okay.” The tear that escapes down her cheek betrays her words for what they are: a lie._

_It’s getting harder to breathe. Blood is pooling at the back of his throat and each time he coughs it up more replaces it. He knows this battle isn’t about endurance but he’s too stubborn to just succumb to the truth. “You have to-” his chest burns and someone pushes his shoulders up allowing him to expel the blood trickling down his throat up and out of his airway. Exhaustion is sapping his strength. He can’t keep going like this but he doesn’t want them to see._

_He won’t force them to watch him die._

_“Jack” is all he manages before a coughing fit overstimulates every nerve in his body. Between the pain and the inability to breathe, he falls limply against the hands on his back. His eyes slip shut and as Emily’s shouts for him to open them grow stronger, more desperate he finds his awareness slipping away._

_Warm hands push at his neck, forcing his head up and back. Opening his airway. “Come on, man.” Derek. He can smell his cologne. “Hang on.” There’s a sort of desperation in his voice that surprises Hotch. They have an odd relationship full of distrust and heated arguments. He wouldn’t consider Morgan to be his biggest fan. “They’re almost here, Hotch. Just hang on a little longer.”_

_The pressure on his chest moves and pain spikes up his torso. His eyes fly open, a weak throaty moan leaving his mouth but he hasn’t got the mind to think about it._

_His fingers are cold. They’re pressed in someone’s hands. He can feel the warmth and yet he’s freezing._

_It’ll be okay._

_Someone cries his name out, a warm hand on his freezing cheek._

_He never fit into their found family. He’s just the boss included in their fun for the sake of politeness and because they pity him. The sad loner who goes home to a son whose mother he let die. Nine permanent reminders scarred on his chest._

_It’ll be okay. They’ll be okay._

_“He’s dead,” the doctor's words echo in Emily’s head. Her chest heaves and tears threaten to spill but she’s better than this and she has to be strong. If not for Hotch, then for the team. It’s what he would want and it’s what he would do. When it was her death, he didn’t ugly cry (not in front of them). “They- The bullets, they just- He bled out on the table.”_

_Aaron Hotchner died assuming things were probably better this way._

**Month One**

She can’t do this.

It’s 5 a.m. in Virginia, the bullpen lights aren’t on. No one’s in yet. That’s the point of her early arrival. She was asked what to do with his belongings. An agent, they’d probably ask Anderson, could clear it out by the morning. It would be done at night, none of them would have to witness it. Strauss thought someone on the team might like to instead to make sure everything gets where it’s supposed to.

_“Aaron cleaned out your things, I just figured I’d offer you the same option.”_

Having heard that, she figures it couldn’t be that hard. She confirms she wishes to do it and that night she spends hours lying awake looking at the ceiling.

The key is heavy in her hand. Wrong.

Hotch never locked his office door. He rarely shut it and then it was to block out the sound of Rossi distracting them with story hour, them goofing off or her and Morgan bickering.

They’d never have him again. The sound of his office door opening won’t have them all standing frozen, like idiots, all watching him as he descends the stairs. Each of them attempting to gauge his mood, waiting for a reprimand or a comment meant to sound authoritative but comes out aspirated. No more _“I better have your reports on my desk by five”_ smoothed over by a smile he can’t hide behind his coffee mug.

All the FBI has left is this office and his smiling picture on a wall.

She finds herself walking towards his desk, sinking into his office chair. It’s incredibly uncomfortable. She draws her knees to her chest, wrapping her arms around them. She spins herself to the desk, looking over all the work he’d left half-done. It’s organized chaos.

The legal pads have incredible neat even notes written on them. They’re descriptive, very similar to the rather obsessive and compulsive notes she knows Rossi takes. It makes her smile in a somber kind of way. He probably learned it under Rossi, some spunky _kid_ wanting to save the world. Unaware of just how much his job would take from him.

What she would give to go back in time, to see that scrappy agent Rossi explained. _“Back when he didn’t know what gel was,” Rossi would snicker and plant himself in a spare chair. “Haley cut his hair and he was built like a beanpole. The kid couldn’t stomach scenes but he’d try his damndest.”_ Rossi would spend hours telling them the stunts Hotch used to pull, reminding them of their boss’ hot head and how human he really was.

She wipes a tear from her eye, sniffling. She’s got a lot of work ahead of her, no need in getting emotional before the heavy lifting even begins. She peels herself from his chair, wondering how he’s spent so many countless hours in that thing.

The law books behind his desk go first. Each one she pulls off the shelf makes her loathe him just a little bit. What good are they doing back there anyway? He wasn’t avidly practicing the law in a way that warranted them but… they are expensive.

And heavy.

She stacks them by the wall closest to the door and by the time the last one comes down her back is burning from the strain. Damn him and damn his dumb law school.

There’s still one shelf left with books when the others are gone. This one is full of books she recognizes but can’t put a finger on why. She pulls the first one out, frowning at the intense sense of deja vu that washes over her. Cracking the cover open, it dawns on her. This one is one of Reid’s favorite books. Looking up, she sees several of his other favorites. The ones he’s constantly telling her about. She recognizes them from his little library in his apartment.

Looking back up, she finds a thick stack of paper. It was wedged between the book in her hand and the one behind it. She recognizes Reid’s handwriting _‘While this copy is better in the original Russian, it would take less time for me to translate it than for you to learn Russian’_. She thumbs through it, smiling at the thought Reid spending government time translating a book from his memory for Hotch.

Tears sting her eyes and she makes a second pile. This one is for things she’s going to make sure are kept.

She finds three more of Reid’s translated books. Each one is worn down in her hands. Well-loved. He’s read them over and over. There’s a lot you can learn about a person when you find out their favorite books but she knows that’s not why Hotch reread them.

There are countless framed pictures of Jack. She doesn’t know it but he employed the same idea Garcia had when she decorated her own office. She struggled, a lot, her first month and it took him a while to find some sort of solution for her. He found it smiling back at him in the airport. It was the single ugliest thing he’d ever laid eyes on but it did the trick. The next day he came in with a tiny troll doll, it’s pink hair spiked high, and one simple order: to decorate her office.

Because neither of them could control the ugliness of their job but they can control their offices.

She finds a troll in his middle desk drawer, clearly a gift from Garcia. Unlike everything else, the drawer is a landmine of things and everything she pulls out makes her chest ache. Alongside the troll, whose hair is bright blue, there is a picture of the team. It’s well-loved. The edges are worn down, the picture having been taken out of its original frame. He’s held it a lot.

She recognizes the background as one of the bars they frequent and it takes her a moment to place the exact date. It was years ago now, his first birthday after Haley’s death. He’d been sulking about the office. Too silent, even for him. He ached and so did they. It was Rossi’s idea to do something about it and he had the perfect plan: get him drunk.

It was the kind of affair that was planned so perfectly that there was no way it could fail. Jessica agreed to take Jack and Henry and if her plan fell through Will was their back-up (and Ried his back-up). No presents were given that day to prevent any suspicion from him. Gifts were for the actual day itself and gift-givers had to have their gifts on his desk before he got into work.

Rossi was the designated driver but getting there wasn’t the hard part. Getting Hotch drunk seemed impossible. He would fight Rossi’s beers, sipping them slowly and defeating their purpose. They knew he was working with a mostly empty stomach but he was exceptionally good at pacing his drinks.

She remembers taking his hand and leading him to the bar. He was pliant, allowing her to just pull him along. She remembers begging him to just try and look happy. The bartender had given her a knowing look when she ordered four water shots and Hotch just looked confused. _“Act likes its tequila and when we get back to that table I want you to give me your best show. Do you understand?”_ And then she’d held the first shot up at him, an eyebrow raised.

He was pretty convincing. She even made a show of tipping the bottom edge back on his third shot while he was playing as hesitant. The fourth water shot went down and she nodded her head and took his hand back. He had the presence to stumble and cough. Even gratefully accepting the beer pushed his way. Over the brim, he glanced at her, unspoken gratitude written all over his faux expression.

At the end of the night, Garcia pulled them for a picture. After a few hours of pretending to be happy, he’d found it wasn’t that hard to just be happy. The smile on his face in the picture is genuine and while no one else ever found out about their stunt it drew them closer together.

The next Monday, in this very office, he’d hugged her and they never talked about. They never told anyone about their dirty little secret but she’d thought a lot about his smile that night and, if the picture was any proof, so had he.

She runs her finger over her face, wiping a tear away before it can fall. She pulls out on the boxes she’d been given. She places the troll alongside the picture and she can only imagine the kind of faces poor Anderson would have going through this stuff. Aaron Hotchner collecting meaningless knickknacks seems impossible but she finds it perfectly fitting. A man stuck in his head and pried from their lives.

The drawer has a strange amount of sticky notes that are all used. She pulls them out, two handfuls of purple and blue sticky notes.

_“If Strauss asks, I told her I couldn’t meet with her individually last night because I was with you -JJ”_

_“There’s a peanut butter & jelly in the fridge with my name on it for you. Eat it or I will force-feed you and don’t think I won’t -JJ <3”_

_“If the boys ask, you said there was a permanent ban on paperclips (I’ll explain later) -JJ”_

_“You suck -JJ”_

They go on. Varying degrees of relation to work, jokes, and just little updates on her life. She finds one worn down like the photo, he’s read it a lot. It says, simply: _“There was nothing you could have done to stop the move. Please don’t blame yourself -love JJ”_.

She’s hit with the memory of being told about JJ’s departure. The way everyone knew something was wrong just by the way Hotch walked back to his office. He’d slammed his door, defeatedly going to the couch in the corner. It’s the most open they’d seen him since Haley’s funeral and it was a dead give away that whatever JJ was going to tell them wasn’t good.

It never really occurred to her that JJ’s departure was a little too close to home, political salt in a healing wound.

There are other things in the drawer. Some predictable like the bandaid and eardrops and others just as surprising as the troll. She finds a pack of earplugs, rainbow, and marbled, with Rossi’s handwriting on the cardboard _“saw these and thought they’d look pretty with your eyes _”.__

__She can only imagine the look Rossi received for this gift but, she has to admit, they’re pretty helpful. Taking into consideration the damage to his ears, more specifically the left, it’s a warranted precaution._ _

__The photos of Jack hurt a little more than she expected them to. He's so young, losing Hotch will- Her stomach twists, floored with a sudden realization: Jack is an orphan. She pulls his smiling picture to her chest, sinking into Hotch’s office chair._ _

__"Tesoro."_ _

__She jumps, not prepared for the sudden intrusion. In the doorway, Dave is leisurely leaning. She wonders how many times he's scared the shit out of Hotch, seemingly appearing out of thin air. She narrows her eyes at him, "what are you doing here?"_ _

__Rossi steps into the office, eyes scanning the room slowly. He’s trying to soak in every bit of Aaron left in the room. He can feel the younger man’s presence and he wants nothing more than for this to all be some cruel joke. For Aaron to pop up and play them the fools, to show them for granted they took him. Dave just wants to pull him into his arms one last time._ _

__He clears his throat, “Erin told me about your deal.” He crosses his arms, clearly not pleased. "I _thought_ Aaron soaked up all that Catholic guilt for the both of you." He shakes his head but his tone is fondly sad. "So, Tesoro, why are you here? Why are you punishing yourself?"_ _

__It's her unraveling. He's Dave and he's safe. So when the tears sting her eyes she doesn't blink them back, she lets them fall. "I just-" she clenches her teeth. Her fists are clenched at her sides, her body shaking with grief and anger and- "No one was there, Dave!" Angry tears spill from her eyes, she's shaking unable to contain herself. "Where was his mom? His-His family?" Ross reaches out but she pulls away. "No one cried for him, Dave! All those people, those stupid agents gathered around like-like grief whores!"_ _

__He pulls her to his chest, rocking her as she sobs. "Let it out, piccolo. Ti ho preso." He whispers soothing Italian to her, rubbing her back. "I've got you. Ti ho preso, bambina."_ _

__Her chest hurts like her heart is literally breaking. "No one had him. No one held him " she cries. "He was alone. He was alone in _life_ and we did nothing, Dave. Then-" Her voice cracks, "then he died alone. Probably-Probably scared and cold and alone."_ _

__Rossi shakes his head, shushing her. He frames her face with his hands, wiping the tears from under her eyes. "Aaron was not alone." His conviction is strong but she's emotional and hurting. "He had a family: us." She opens her mouth but he shakes his head. "His father was a son of a bitch. His mother disowned him. Sean is in prison."_ _

__It's sad, it's awful, but it's true._ _

__"Look around, Tesoro." He motions to the desk with Hotch's things, the one with the items from the center drawer. " _We're_ Jack's aunts and uncles. We were Aaron's family and if memory serves you held his hand until they took him back for surgery. He was never alone. Until his very last breathe he knew his family was waiting for him in the waiting room." He presses a kiss to her forehead, pulling her back into a hug. _ _

__She melts this time. Giving in, taking his word. "I miss him, " she whispers._ _

__Rossi takes a deep breath. "I do too." He squeezes her one last time before stepping back. "How about we get this mess cleaned up?" Rossi looks around, shaking his head. "I always thought that boy could have used this space better."_ _

__Emily laughs but it's forced and wrong but it's an attempt._ _

__"So, " Rossi claps his hands together. "You wanna start with that ugly ass American baseball poster or by drinking the scotch he keeps in the bottom drawer?"_ _

__Emily wipes the tears under her eyes, laughing despite the pain in her chest. "Scotch, " she says. "Definitely the scotch."_ _

__**Month Two** _ _

__“Agent!” The director isn’t in the mood for pleasantries. The BAU causes him more troubles than they’re worth and Emily Prentiss’ dramatics, no matter how warranted, are progressing the symptoms of her upcoming migraine. She takes a long, deep breath. This, as everything else with BAU, is a unique situation and she understands why Agent Prentiss is reacting the way she is._ _

__Still, the whole affair has been taxing. “I understand,” the director admits. “You’re, no doubt, overwhelmed with emotions and after a month I’d imagine your team’s grieving process is coming along nicely-”_ _

__Emily crosses her arms, afraid to let the other woman see her trembling hands. “We buried him, ma’am.” She can’t meet her eyes because all Emily sees is that sleek black casket. The way Reid’s lower lip trembled as he fought to keep his tears at bay. Morgan’s blank face, emotionless. The two have been inseparable, the only way they’ve come out of this whole mess without falling apart._ _

__A part of her thinks it’s all too good to be true. “My team carried his casket. I-” her voice breaks. “We,” she amends. “We are finally starting to heal and you-” Emily scowls at the woman before her. “You took him away from us.” Emily steals herself, wiping her eyes, and straightening her back. Hostilities won’t get her anywhere no matter how badly she wants to wring the other woman’s neck. “I understand that I am not to tell anyone that Agent Hotchner is alive.” She looks down the hall, “Is that all?”_ _

__“No,” the director crosses her arms over her chest. “Agent Hotchner has been intubated several times over the course of the month. His lungs-” she clenches her jaw, headache intensifying. “His body,” she corrects, “has been under a lot of stress. Two weeks ago he was placed in a medical coma, Tuesday morning they completed taking him off the medication.” The director frowns, “we need you to evaluate his mental facilities. In payment, if you accept, you’ll be allowed to spend the week getting him adjusted for his reassignment.”_ _

__Emily looks at the manilla folder being extended to her. She knows what’s inside because JJ once handed her an identical folder. “I understand,” she takes the folder. “May I?” She gestures down the hall, where she knows Hotch is waiting._ _

__The director nods, “you can’t look in the folder.”_ _

__“I’ll put him at danger,” Emily stats numbly, already walking away. “I’m aware.”_ _

__“I’d hate for you to have to bury him twice, agent.”_ _

__It takes every bit of her willpower to keep moving forward. Hand clenched at her side, she reminds herself that Hotch is waiting two doors down. Two more doors down and she’s home._ _

__She steps into the doorway- she couldn’t have been more wrong._ _

__The offwhite soft restraints around his wrist are darker than his skin. His normal pallor is nothing to the nearly translucent sick of his skin under the hospital lights. He might as well be dead. Nothing about him looks alive. His chest rises and falls because a tube down his throat forces it too. His skin- she has to look away. She draws back in fright, tears stinging in her eyes. His hands are cold._ _

__“What did they do to you?” A month. He’s had no visitors. Everyone that he loves thinks he’s dead. He’s been completely alone and they wonder why his body has failed him. _Fuck_ their medical excuses. He’s a fighter and no amount of damage would stop him from coming back to them but if he thinks he’s fighting for no one…_ _

__She thumbs through his chart. It doesn’t have his name on it. Just the letters A. H. She finds the beginning of the chart, childhood ailments and she’s overwhelmed with fury at the clear signs of abuse in front of her._ _

__An emergency room visit, broken arm, cause: bike accident._ _

__An emergency room visit, a broken clavicle, sprained wrist, and black eye, cause: fell down the stairs._ _

__The list just goes on and on and it makes her sick. She’s about the throw the chart back at the end of the bed, sickened at how thick it is (shouldn’t there be a quota? Shouldn’t people be able to stop suffering at a certain point? He’s had it bad enough, shouldn’t there be a limit? A point where it stops?)_ _

__She startles, a soft gagging sound pulling her from the file in her hand. She locks eyes with him._ _

__His chest heaves from the bed, the soft restraints pull taut as his arms strain to move. He gags, tears rolling down his eyes as he fights will all of his might to be released. She’s frozen, in fear, and completely unsure of what to do. She watches as his soft hazel eyes roll up into his head, body going limp, before tensing so tight she knows it’s painful. She staggers backward, watching as he seizes right in front of her._ _

__Two nurses and a doctor come in, shouting a code and attempting to soothe Hotch but it’s all too no avail._ _

__Emily stands against the wall. Three people, that’s it? Hotch has nearly given his life countless times for this stupid country and all he’s offered is three lousy staff members who don’t even know his name._ _

__“Agent Prentiss?”_ _

__JJ told her, after returning from the dead, that Hotch had to be forced to leave the hospital. The funeral was hard but it was even worse knowing that she was alive and still walking the sharp line of weak and unstable. JJ told her everything. That Hotch had a panic attack outside her hospital room on multiple occasions, bottling up everything and pushing his emotions down._ _

__There was a moment when JJ thought the secret would kill him._ _

__“Agent Prentiss?”_ _

__She looks up from the cold tile, unaware of her surroundings. Somehow, she’d been removed from Hotch’s room or maybe she’d just walked away. Either way, she’s sitting on the floor of a deserted hallway. “Yes, ma’am?”_ _

__The doctor smiles softly, “you can go back in.”_ _

__Emily rises to her feet slowly. She’s not sure she wanted to see him. Can she be the stoic, unwavering force for him that he was for her? Is that what he needs? She considers that stoic and unwavering were what she needed back then because _he_ was what she needed. _ _

__Does he need her?_ _

__The tube has been replaced with an oxygen mask, a mistake on the hospital's part. If there’s one thing she’s learned sitting at his bedside over the years it’s that unless medical equipment is physically bound to him he will remove it and even then still might try to escape. Namely, this means intubation tubes, IVS, the pulse px clamp, oxygen masks, oxygen canals- anything he can get his hands on. Stepping closer, she sees they’ve left the soft restraints on to prevent him from just that and she’s not sure if that’s better or worse._ _

__He’s sleeping. His torso is turned at his hips, legs prone and straight in front of him, while the rest of his body attempts to curl to the right. There’s something peaceful about his sleep that she knows is drug-induced. He snores, in his natural sleep. It’s not cartoonish and loud, Rossi is the proud owner of that, but soft and easy to miss. He sighs a lot in his sleep, mumbles, and smiles. He smiles a lot._ _

__Now he’s just limp. Boneless._ _

__From what she gathered from his file and from what the director told her, maybe that’s for the best. The wounds she saw were all towards his chest. The kind of wounds that are life-threatening and in your face about it. At the hospital, they found a bullet lodged in his leg. IT had hit and stayed in the same location but it severed nerves, jellied muscle, and the surgeons have a hopeful prognosis but mobility… they’re not sure the leg is going to make it._ _

__There are other problems. His eardrum burst again each time he’s coherent enough to talk to, no one’s managed to get a word out of him. A nurse said he was looking at her lips when she was talking to him, confused like he couldn’t hear her. The doctor suspects brain damage from blood loss._ _

__But they don’t know._ _

__That’s why she’s here. To profile him and then narc on him to their superiors. Too often history repeats itself that way but the familiarity still stings._ _

__“Hey.” She sits up, frowning when she finds him silently watching her. “Hotch?” She reaches out to take his hand until she realizes he’s straining the restraint to put his wrist over the side of the raised guard rail. “What do-” she watches his hand and realizes he’s moving his hand like he’s writing. “Wait a second-” she stands up, patting her pockets down for a pen. Her eyes land on the file at the end of the bed. “I got it.”_ _

__She grabs the chart and pen attached, bringing them to him. She presses the pen into his waiting palm and holds the file up for him so he can see it. It occurs to her that he’s a leftie, he struggles to hold the pen but after a moment he shakily starts to draw deformed letters._ _

__F-_ _

__O-_ _

__Y-_ _

__“Foyet?” She asks before he finishes and he draws his eyes up to her nodding. “Dead,” there’s something about the way he looks so relieved that hurts her even more. He lets the pen roll out of his hand, satisfied. When she looks back up he’s already falling back to sleep. His eyes are on her the whole time like he’s trying to stay awake but his body won’t let him. “Get some rest,” she reassures him, placing her hand over his. “I’ll be right here.”_ _

__She falls asleep in her chair. It’s the first peaceful sleep she’s had all month and probably thanks to the living dead man beside her. Unfortunately, his own slumber isn’t as peaceful._ _

__At first, she’s not sure what she’s heard. She sits up in her chair, pulling the blanket someone’s draped over her higher. The second time she hears it, she looks over and realizes it’s Hotch. He’s moving in his sleep, small contained motions as he fights an invisible monster._ _

__He grunts, all soft sounds she should have missed, but somehow didn’t. She leans over the guard rail, placing a hand on his right clavicle and shaking gently. “Hey,” she keeps her voice down hoping not to scare him. “Hotch,” she moves her hand to his face and his eyes fly open. His eyes pinch in pain, whimpering as all his moving causes a spike of pain. “Aaron?”_ _

__He’s breathing hard, trembling. It occurs to her that he’s not in his right mind. He’s exhausted, in pain, and his body is worn down._ _

__If it were anyone she wouldn’t hesitate but it’s Hotch…_ _

__She pulls the guard rail down, watching him carefully. Hesitantly, she sits on the bed's edge and he moves his hand over to hers. The gesture gives her all the courage she needs. “I’m going to take your hands out of the restraints,” she tells him, slipping the fabric off. She lays down beside him, curled up onto her side. They lay facing each other._ _

__Slowly, uncoordinated, and sluggish he raises his hand to his face. He pulls the oxygen mask off his face. “Sorry,” he croaks._ _

__She shakes her head, “it’s okay.” Gently, she reaches up and pushes it back over his mouth. “I’ve missed you.”_ _

__She tells herself that the team doesn’t suspect a thing but her phone’s been ringing off the clock. They’re terrified because of what decisions he made when it was her that was dead. She knows about him leaving for that task force. How one day he was in the office and the next all they had was a lengthy letter with detailed instructions and a single phone number to reach him by._ _

__Now, they fear she’ll do the same._ _

__The look he settles on says all the words he can’t form._ _

__She frowns, his confusion is warranted, but the wound is still fresh. “You’re dead, Aaron.” The tears that form in his eyes break her heart. She places her hand on his cheek, shaking her head as she fails to come up with the proper thing to say. “It wasn’t my decision, it was out of our hands. You were in danger and-”_ _

__Her tears break to the surface at his soft, heartbroken, “no.”_ _

__“Aaron, I’m so sorry.”_ _

__He turns his head, chest rising as he cries. He tries to lift his left hand but she’s only freed the right and it makes his panic swell to nearly suffocating. Turning his head away, pain rips up his side. For a terrifying moment, he can't breathe. He can’t think._ _

__“Stop,” she sits up, leaning over him and quickly undoing the restraint around his left wrist. “There-”_ _

__He sits up, ignoring the nearly blinding pain that eats up his chest. He lets out a grunt of pain, trembling under the strain of his muscles. Anger tinged with panic and pain eats him alive and he reaches up with intense, overwhelming emotion and tears the oxygen masks off his face._ _

__“They’ll never forgive me,” he sobs, trembling as he fails to get out of the bed. “Please, Emily,” tears are streaming down his eyes and he’s giving in to his weakness. He looks at her and she knows all the emotions he’s trying to convey. Desperation written in solitude. He needs the team. “Emily,” he whispers hoarsely, body starting to fail his fight. “They’ll never forgive me for this. They hardly did last time.” He buries his head in his hands, sobbing._ _

__They’ll hate him. Hiding Emily was hard enough but when they isolated him, stopped confiding in him, and talking to him- They didn’t even know he had been the one to come up with the order, didn’t know he was lying and they hated him. He let her die. He was the leader and he failed._ _

__“Aaron.”_ _

__His heart is racing and in a fit of rage, rips the pulse ox off his finger. For a second there’s blissful silence and then, like nails on a chalkboard, alarms everywhere. His whole body is tense, cold sweat raising the hair on his arms, and his stomach sunk so low he’s not how he can feel nauseous._ _

__“I can’t-” he drags his hand over his face. “Please.”_ _

__His little trio of medical personnel come in. He looks to Emily, silently begging her to stop this, but she just watches in silent sorrow. They unload a full cocktail into his bloodstream, asking her to help ease him back down onto the pillows._ _

__He fights the drugs, even if it’s futile and weak. He tries to keep himself upright until his head goes fuzzy. His eyes try to roll back, his body sinking. A hand cups the back of his neck, easing him back to the bed. Emily is looking down at him, letting the nurse pull the oxygen mask over his face and the pulse ox back on his finger. “It’s going to be okay,” she promises but they both know that’s not true. Nothing is okay. The world has flipped upside down once again._ _

__“I want to believe you,” he whispers softly. “I really do.”_ _

__**Month Three** _ _

_“I got what you asked for,” she sets his go-bag down on the bed beside him. Today Aaron Hotchner leaves and dead or alive she won’t see him again until this whole mess is settled. He might as well be dead. “Threw in an extra sweater,” she mumbles, rubbing at the strap anxiously. “In case they send you somewhere cold.”_

_He tosses the bag onto the wheelchair pulled up to the bed’s edge. He knows hospital procedure well enough to know that they’re not letting him out of this place unless he’s in that wheelchair. On the other hand, it’s probably for the best that they enforce that rule so that he doesn't overexert himself for the sake of his ego._

_A part of him knows what he wants to do but he’s not sure what he’s allowed to do._

_Emily clears her throat and hands him a plastic bag full of suckers, pre-packaged peanuts, two slim jims, and a Capri-sun. “They won’t stop at all until they get wherever they’re taking you,” she explains, remembering her own trip cross country under the supervision of the FBI. “You’ll get hungry.”_

_He smiles, mostly because he thinks about the fact that Emily Prentiss regularly buys Capri-suns. They’re one of her comfort foods. The smile turns a little sad at the thought that by extension and implication, she’s trying to comfort him. “Thank you,” he manages but he can’t meet her eyes. He’s afraid to see her emotions burning bright._

_She takes his hand like she has a hundred times over the course of the last month. Tears sting her eyes but she blinks them away. “Be safe,” she whispers. She squeezes his hand and he looks over at her. “I mean it, Aaron. I can’t… I can’t actually lose you. Okay?”_

_He looks at her lips, jaw clenched as he fights everything instinct within him to kiss her. He nods, unable to trust his voice._

_Emily cups the back of his head, breathing picking up as her heart pounds in her chest. She’s tentative, uneasy as she presses her lips to his._

_“No,” Hotch pulls away, voice hoarse and shaky. “We can’t-”_

_She silences him with a hard kiss, this one hungry and needy. He moans, hand grabbing her hip in his palm. She pulls away, breathing hard. Her cheeks flush, “sorry. I don’t know what came over me. I shouldn’t have-”_

_His hand raises to the back of her head, fingers spreading through her hair as he pulls her back to him. His lips attack her hungrily, drawing out their heated kiss for as long as he can until his lungs burn. “Now we’re even,” he states breathlessly, eyes on her swollen lips._

_An agent at the door clears his throat, realizing he’s interrupted a heated moment. “We’re ready if you are, sir.”_

_Hotch leans heavily on the guard rail as he stands, his arm trembling as his other hand presses into his side. Emily stands to help but he shakes his head, “I got it.” He puts his go-bag over the back of the wheelchair, taking his time to carefully lower himself into the chair._

_“Are you sure you’re ready to leave?” She knows he is and if he wasn’t they’re out of time anyway. The adrenaline from their kiss and thought of him leaving has her has left her with trembling hands and unwavering anxiety._

_Hotch knows he loves her. He’s known it for years. “Can we have a moment?” he asks the agent at the door._

_Hotch rubs at the side of his neck, “ Emily, I-” His heart is pounding, there’s cold sweat down the back of his neck. “The way I feel when you’re around-” he shakes his head, the words stuck on the edge of his tongue. “I love you. I have been in love with you for so long now that-” A tear slides down his cheek, his emotions are high and there’s so much at stake. “I don’t want to ask you to wait, it’s unfair, but I just need you to know that there isn’t anyone else for me. It’s you. It’s always been you.”_

_She shakes her head, "don't leave me."_

_He has to look away. He can't stand the sight of her hurting. "It won't be long," he has to believe that. "We've got forever to make up for all that we've missed out on-"_

_"I want now," her voice breaks._

_The agent knocks at the door again, "Sir, I hate to do this to you but they're ready to leave."_

_Hotch nods, "alright."_

_Emily watches, tears streaming down her eyes as he's wheeled away. "Aaron," she calls softly._

_"I promise," his voice is low, his tone serious. "Forever, do you hear me, Emily Prentiss? What's a month or two compared to forever?" He pulls in a deep breath, gathering all his courage. "I love you."_

_And no matter how badly she wants to say it back, she doesn't._

__“What are you hiding?”_ _

__Emily looks up from her file, pen still hovering over the paper. “Excuse me?” Of course, she’s not surprised it’s Rossi. There is not a shred of doubt in her mind that Reid’s been steadily watching her for the better part of an hour, queuing the others into what he’s observed: which is nothing. She knows because they used to do the same thing to Hotch and back then, Rossi was their messenger._ _

__He steps into the office, shutting the door behind himself. He clears his throat, regarding her with an air that tells her he already thinks he knows but she knows for a fact he doesn’t. “You’ve been biting your nails again,” he comments, pointing so she can’t deny it. “Now, I noticed it about a month ago but whatever it is really started bothering you yesterday.” He crosses his arms on his chest, “so, you gonna tell papa Rossi or am I going to have to figure it out myself.”_ _

__She considers him for a moment and then she remembers she's wearing the weight of Hotch's life on her shoulder. "Papa Rossi," she mumbles, shaking her head. She tosses her pen down, abandoning her work. "The answer, to your rather invasive question, is nothing."_ _

__He puffs, rolling his eyes. "Lie to someone else." His frown intensifies, his worry thick along his brow. "You look rough, Bella."_ _

__She shakes her head, "you're going to _bella_ me and then call me rough looking?" She's buying herself time and lying to him is more stressful than hiding Aaron. The pressure in her chest and the anxiety is awful. She runs her hands over her face, failing miserably at keeping her composure. "Want a drink?"_ _

__She needs a girl's night. A proper girls night with booze, Richard Gere, Julia Roberts, and tooth-rotting sweets. _Not_ sitting around being miserable. Then, maybe she could tell them about how "a man" kissed her last night. That they were saying goodbye for what could be an indefinite amount of time and he told her he loved her. _ _

__"Is there a good reason for your hands to be shaking like that?" While Emily has knocked back her two thumbs of Scotch and refilled the glass, Rossi is just sitting with his. "You know you can tell me anything, right?"_ _

__She clenches her jaw and keeps her eyes over his shoulder. "Dave-" she opens her mouth to scramble together some bullcrap excuse but the moment her eyes meet his, she loses it. She buries her head in her hands, pushing her drink away._ _

__He puts his own drink down, leaning his elbows on his knees as he studies her. “By anything, Emily, I mean anything.” He knows she’s under a lot of stress. Just like Hotch, she’s taking on too much so that the team can stay together and happy. He knows all too well that worked for Hotch. “You don’t have to worry about scaring me or burdening me.”_ _

__A tear falls down her cheek but she shakes her head. “I’m just having a bad day,” she wipes the tear away, picking her glass back up. “That’s all.”_ _

___She hurts. It’s paralleled to the pain she felt thinking he was dead. This feels worse, though. Before, goodbye was ripped from her hands. She didn’t have to think of anything to say but now she’s got a whole a day to come up with the right thing. Everythings changed too but she’s not sure she can say it. She’s not sure she’s allowed to._ _ _

__Rossi looks at the woman sitting across from him and he knows she’s lying. Anyone could clearly see it and it pains him that he can’t do anything to help her. He moves from his chair to the couch beside her, smiling when she leans back against the arm he wraps around the back. She lays her head on his chest, holding her drink close to her body._ _

__“I miss him too,” Rossi whispers. He misses teasing Hotch and random Saturday visits. “I find myself waiting for him to barge into my office. To fiddle with the things on my desk or steal my liquor.”_ _

__Emily chuckles._ _

__“It does get better,” Rossi promises,” and it’s okay to have a bad day.”_ _

__Emily agrees but she wishes Hotch was here to hear about it. He would take her out for lunch or sneak her a Tylenol when the boys start acting up in the bullpen. She could bring him a coffee as an excuse to catch him up on gossip she heard from JJ._ _

__But he’s not here._ _

__She’s alone._ _

__**Month Four** _ _

__Rossi pauses in his story, watching in confusion as Emily throws her office door open. She’s barefoot, having kicked off her hills while she was doing paperwork, but her stocking covered feet don’t stop her. She barrels past them and straight into the arms of a tall, thin, jean-clad man._ _

__The man’s laugh echoes through the bullpen and Rossi rises to his feet, knowing it anywhere. “Aaron,” he breathes, shaking his head in disbelief as Emily pulls back enough to reveal Hotch’s smiling face._ _

__“Easy,” Hotch breathes against Emily’s neck. It’s been a long month of physical therapy and downright miracles but that doesn’t equate a full recovery. “Still a little broken.” He knows that’s an understatement. Eventually, so will she but he wants to shield her from that as best as he can. But his attempt at humor is forced and wrong, it scares her. She knows him too well and it's all too much._ _

__She looks afraid because she’s terrified he’s a trick. This is all some terrible trick. She places her hands on his face, thumbs caressing his cheek. Tears swell in her eyes, she finds the scar on his chin from the New York car bomb and she knows without a doubt it’s him._ _

__His own fears play delusionally into his insecurities, namely the cane in his right hand that spells of his unpromising prognosis. Things have changed in the last month and he can’t blame her if she doesn’t want to be with an older man who’s going to be stuck with a cane, probably, for the rest of his life. He couldn’t even hate her. Not even if he wanted to, not even a little, not at all._ _

__He can see the fear in her face, the way her lips twist, and it breaks his heart. He searches for an answer but her dark eyes are sad and nervous. It freaks him out. He feels suddenly overwhelmed, afraid. "Bum ear… bum leg, " his voice trembled, and his face may not betray his fear but his voice does. "I would- I would understand…" his face flushes._ _

__"You think-" Emily laughs and it's an awful choked sound. She throws her hand over her mouth. There's a moment where she nearly wins but then she tosses her head back and howls with laughter._ _

__The corner of his mouth lofts with joy he can't hide. She might tell him no. She might tell him she never loved him to begin with or question how he could blame her for falling out of love. But she's so happy, so giddy that the encroaching pain in his chest is washing away with each lung full of air she exhales in a laugh._ _

__"Aaron, " she frames his face with her hands, stepping closer to him. "If you were completely deaf _and_ blind or if you were paralyzed or-" she shakes her head. "None of that matters, " her conviction is heartwarming and the kiss she plants on his mouth is breathtaking. “I just want you. Broken, bruised, bloody, I don’t care. So long as you’re you.” She kisses him, holding his face in her hands so he can’t pull away. It’s breathtaking._ _

__“Let the man come up for air, woman!” Rossi shouts, clapping his hands. He’s the only one seemingly able to react to all of this, not that anyone can blame them. Hotch is standing alive in front of them and they just watched him get made out with by Emily. Confusion is certainly warranted._ _

__Hotch hands his head sheepishly, burying it in Emily’s shoulder. She wraps an arm around his shoulders, laughing at her shock. She turns in her half-hug to face the others, not surprised to see mixed types of equal confusion and anger._ _

__She lets out a shaky breath, releasing Hotch. "I don't have the words to convey how sorry I am." She lied to them. They might not forgive her, in their shoes this betrayal stings like a deep wound being ripped off its scab. It may have been years ago but all too soon she's playing them the fools as JJ & Hotch once did for her. "The past three months have been hard for everyone." She leaves out that no matter how helpless and alone they felt she's had it worse. _ _

__His death was nearly her unraveling._ _

__It all fell upon her shoulders to kill and bury the man she loves._ _

__"I know you're grappling to come to terms with the accident and I'm-" she looks over her shoulder at Hotch. His body tilted to the right as he leans on the cane in his hand. He looks nothing like himself. He’s grown out his beard. Replaced his signature suits with a grey Hanes t-shirt and a pair of jeans."I'm-” tears are filling her eyes and her filing system ability to compartmentalize is falling right through her fingers._ _

__He’s lost more weight than what’s healthy but he still manages a wrought smile. Aaron Hotchner has been her vice and her demise since the day she met him on the steps of the ambassador’s house. She regarded him as a thing to study back then. Easy to look at but hard to read he was the perfect mystery._ _

__Now-_ _

__“Bella,” Rossi coos in that soft, broken voice. He speaks to her like she’s a small frightened animal. He steps closer to her, placing a hand on her shoulder. Clearly trying to rope in whatever it is she’s trying to tell them. He used to look at her with those knowing smiles and for a moment she would think he knew. He knows about her and Aaron. That he, somehow, knew that Hotch isn't dead._ _

__“You protect him, just as he did you.” The younger man had always been special to Rossi, coming into his life all too soon after losing his son. He’d hit all the right places within Rossi’s once heavily guarded heart. Emily is like the daughter he never had. “Are we hurt that you had to lie to us again? Yes. It hurts me more though, to know that you’ve been carrying the burden all by yourself.”_ _

__Emily should be worried about the hurt look in Reid’s eyes or the tears already falling from JJ’s and Garcia’s but she’s spent too many nights tossing and turning as she imagines all the horrible ways his cover could be blown. It’s been too long since she’s held him or kissed him or touched him. She just doesn't care. For one second she needs this to be about her. About how much she's suffered and the hell the two of them have been through._ _

__But, it's not about her._ _

__Garcia pulls him into a hug. She's seen him worse than this, she doesn't even blink. Her head finds his shoulder and she lets a sob. “You don’t smell right,” she says squeezing him. Their relationship has always been a strong one. Between his adoration of her ability to be herself, _“I know you see the good in people, always, and I would never want you to change that”_ to her being his right-hand man _“Wild horses, sir, just wild horses”_. They complement one another. The dark and the light._ _

__When she pulls back from the hug, he’s smiling down at her. His left eyebrow raised quizzically at her comment and at her noticing. “The Old Spice I use wasn’t available when I went shopping.” His head is tilted down and to the side, a relaxed smile on his face when Garcia steps back and JJ steps in for her own hug._ _

__“Don’t you _ever_ do that again.” JJ isn’t like Garcia. He’s found, he never has the right things to say to her and, to her credit, she’s learned that. They’re more like Batman and Robin. An inseparable team that doesn’t require verbal communication to understand one another. It’s the kind of balance that stems from years of working together._ _

__As she wipes a tear from under her eye, stealing herself, he finds it within himself to nod. “I’ll do my best.” But it’s not that simple not with this team and never with Hotch._ _

__JJ leaves her hand on his chest for a moment, taking solace in how it feels to physically know he’s standing before her breathing. Tears still in her eyes, she shakes her head. “I want better than your best.” Her eyes shimmer, _you’ve changed.__ _

___Solitude and pain change people_ but his mouth says, “of course.”_ _

__Reid and Morgan are keeping their distance. Understandably._ _

__Garcia grieved openly and proudly. She made sweets for them and kept them fed. Doing the only thing she knew how she kept their spirits high and offered to take over some of Hotch’s old work. And she grieved the loss of her friend. JJ did the same. Spent more time at home with her own sons, reminded the hard way how their jobs take and take and take-_ _

__Between Reid and Morgan, the tension was high. Reid was grappling with abandonment issues and Morgan's trust. Deep down, Reid checked his grief off as another example of a fatherly figure leaving him high and dry. Once again, Reid felt perhaps he really was the only one to blame. Morgan was angry. He might have been quicker, they could have been successful if he trusts Hotch but he didn’t and doesn’t trust the other man and now-_ _

__The physical tension of Morgan and Reid’s silence rips through Hotch. He looks to the others, not surprised to find them all profiling him so openly. “Profiling me already?” He meets Emily’s eyes and all of his frustration melts away. He’s been dead for three months, there is going to be some tension. Any heat he may have started to feel is gone in an instant._ _

__Rossi breaks the silence, stepping up to properly greet his old prodigy. He pulls the younger man against his chest, smirking. “How do you feel?” He pulls back just enough to really get a good look at Hotch. Rossi cups his cheek in his palm, tears shimmering in his eyes. “God, it’s so good to see you, son.”_ _

__Morgan steps up, the three of them forming a small triangle. He looks Hotch up and down, frowning at the cane in his hand. “How much longer is that thing around?” He motions to the cane, the unasked question being if Hotch can come back._ _

__Hotch lifts it up, rubbing his thumb into the handle anxiously. He shrugs, “the doctors don’t know.”_ _

__Emily raises an eyebrow, “have you been going to physical therapy?”_ _

__He opens his mouth but doesn’t confirm nor deny._ _

__“I still go for my knee,” Reid informs them softly. His eyes are on the floor but he’s moved closer. “I could ask my therapist if she’s willing to add anyone else on.” He wraps his arms around himself, “she’s nice. You’d like her.”_ _

__Hotch steps forward, ignoring the voice in the back of his head that tells him not to move. He knows the others are watching, taking in just how pronounced his limp is and he knows it’s bad. He moves to Reid anyways, covering the distance in three steps._ _

__Reid isn’t expecting to be pulled into the hug but he relents, burying his face in Hotch’s chest. His hand wraps around Hotch, gripping his shirt tightly so he doesn’t pull away._ _

__“I’m sorry,” Hotch tells him. “They wouldn’t let me decide who to tell. The decision wasn’t mine and it wasn’t Emily’s.” Hotch can feel Reid crying but the genius doesn't say anything. “Reid, please-”_ _

__Reid swallows thickly, trying to convince his deceptive brain that the arms around him are familiar. He knows them. They’re the arms that held him after Tobias. The arms that he fled to after Maeve. The arms that have pulled him out of danger and poured him into cabs when he’s too tired to function. “I forgive you,” he whispers because he can’t hate Hotch. He’s never failed Reid. He’s always been there._ _

__They pull apart and Hotch forces himself to smile, nodding._ _

__Reid smiles back, wiping his eyes with his sleeve. “Sorry I cried on your shoulder.”_ _

__Hotch looks down, not surprised to find his shirt a little damp. “ ‘s okay.”_ _

__There’s a moment of content silence shared by them all. Everything is just okay, normal for a moment._ _

__Rossi claps his hands together, “get your coats people!” They know just from the tone of voice what he’s going to say. “It’s five o’clock! I want you all at mine by six-thirty, do you understand?” He looks down at his watch, “chop! Chop! You’re wasting time standing here and looking at me!”_ _

__The room fills with shouts of varying degrees and Reid smiles ever so softly. Morgan hooks Reid under his arm, “I’ll drive you home, pretty boy.”_ _

__“I mean it,” Rossi says to Reid in particular knowing the genius’ habit of running late. “Be on time!”_ _

__The room empties, quickly, leaving just Hotch and Emily._ _

__“Are you sure you’re up for this?” They’re standing toe-to-toe, lips so close they brush as she speaks. “I’m sure they’d understand-”_ _

__He kisses her gently, hand cupping her jaw. “Emily,” he whispers, “it’s all I’ve wanted for the last few months. I’m more than ready.”_ _

__She nods and takes his hand. Her thumb brushes over his knuckles. It’s not going to be easy, any of this, but Emily’s never been one to settle, and neither has run from a challenge in their lives. “I love you, you know that don’t you?”_ _

__He smiles down at her and despite all the horror in their lives, he has this certainty. He’s feared forgetting how but he knows, looking down at her that she loves him. “I love you too.”_ _

__

___**“You’re the only person I’ve ever met who seems to have the faintest conception of what I mean when I say a thing.” -Virginia Wolf** _ _ _

**Author's Note:**

> Why did Hotch have to fake his death? I don't know. I don't have a reason. I just wanted to hurt him


End file.
